One would think that “open source” is all about sharing. But that’s a misconception. Example: Try to use some GPL‘d code in your non-GPL OSS project. Oh, the humanity.
So called “proprietary” software at least believes in “buying love”. They won’t show you the source but for a price, you can at least use their work without many questions asked.
OSS is different. If you use the wrong license, you must be a moron (proof: You’re using a different license than me. QED) Nobody wants to share their hard work with morons!
Especially not since the process to select the “perfect” OSS license is so painful. You need to read legalese, try to understand it, reason with the nice smiling person on the other side of the padded wall (a.k.a “outside”) that you’re not insane – the rest of the world is and you can prove it.
Ever tried to get some OSS project to share their code under second license? It’s a lot of fun – unless you’re serious. Then … it’s not so much fun.
Why I’m ranting?
I spend a lot of time on stackoverflow. It’s cool. It’s full of source.
But can you use any piece of that source code in your OSS project?
Are you sure?
You are. Splendid. Do you really think a lawyer would see this the same way?
Commenting Code
1. March, 2012A lot of people way “you must comment your code.”
Kevlin Henney wrote an excellent piece on this topic in 97 Things Every Programmer Should Know: Comment Only What the Code Cannot Say
It really boils down to the last sentence: “Comment what the code cannot say, not simply what it does not say.”
There are various reasons why people demand comments:
Only #3 is a valid reason for comments. #1 is just adding noise for people who shouldn’t touch the code anyway. #2 means you should refactor the code to make its intent clear – adding comments will only make things worse.
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